THE WISDOM OF AMERIGO BONASERA

I believe in America. America has made my fortune. And I raised my daughter in the American fashion. I gave her freedom, but -- I taught her never to dishonor her family. She found a boyfriend; not an Italian. She went to the movies with him; she stayed out late. I didn't protest. Two months ago, he took her for a drive, with another boyfriend. They made her drink whiskey. And then they tried to take advantage of her. She resisted. She kept her honor. So they beat her, like an animal. When I went to the hospital, her nose was a'broken. Her jaw was a'shattered, held together by wire. She couldn't even weep because of the pain. But I wept. Why did I weep? She was the light of my life -- beautiful girl. Now she will never be beautiful again. Sorry... I -- I went to the police, like a good American. These two boys were brought to trial. The judge sentenced them to three years in prison-- suspended sentence. Suspended sentence! They went free that very day! I stood in the courtroom like a fool. And those two bastard, they smiled at me! Then I said to my wife, "for justice, we must go to Don Corleone."

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When I worked at the school in San Diego that shall remain nameless (I’ll give you a hint: they just joined the Big East) it was basically four straight years of drunken debauchery. 8 years after I left I’m still paying off credit card bills from the bar tabs I ran up 5-6 nights a week. But I don’t regret any of it (well, maybe I wish I had a little more game and could’ve nailed a few more of those lovely SoCal girls). This story, however, is one of the few stories I have that doesn’t involve me winding up shitfaced drunk. But don’t worry, I promise it’s still worth reading!

...it also has one of the more beautiful skylines in America.

It was Friday morning, the day before our first home football game. You’d think I’d be excited when I woke up, but instead I was still hurting from the night before. Not hungover or anything, I took it fairly easy, but it was a long night nonetheless. We had a birthday party for Country and there were about six of my students out, all of them but Tripod looking hot. There were also people from work, including Wayne The Mormon and some girl that had been throwing herself at him for a couple weeks. On top of all that, there were maybe twenty athletes there, which made my presence very inappropriate.

But this isn’t going to be one of my typical stories of drunken debauchery. Like I said, I didn’t drink that much, but I did have to deal with Country getting severely intoxicated; Tripod and one of my new employees getting freaky on the dance floor; and my student G-Man showing up shitfaced and getting into it with his ex-girlfriend/varsity swimmer/my friend Erica. So after we closed the bar down at 2, I was trying to round everyone up to figure out who shouldn’t be driving, while Erica hung on my arm about to cry because G-Man was being a drunken asshole (I love that guy), when all of a sudden G-Man wants to talk to her. I tried to dissuade him, told him to sober up and call her tomorrow, but he insisted, and the dumb girl sent her friends home so she could go with him. To make a long story short, I ended up driving Tripod, G-Man and his three roommates, and Erica across the beach to G-Man’s place, where we had one more drink, everyone else started breaking out the pot, G-Man and Erica disappeared back to his room to “talk” (not to be seen again), and I didn’t get home until after 3.

—

So I rolled into work about 9:30 and the day begins. Won’t bore you with details, but this is a very stressful time. Normally, the day before a football game we take a crew down to the stadium and we all put in about four or five hours doing stuff so Saturday will be an easier day. Well, the Padres were playing this night, so we couldn’t do that, which means we’re already behind schedule. And to top it all off, someone decided to schedule our annual cross country meet and a soccer game on the same day. At a BCS school that wouldn’t be a big deal, but since it takes our entire workforce to run a football game it poses a major problem.

It was quickly becoming a miserable day with all of us running in different directions, and it’s not helping that my coworker Joe (Eddie Munster we call him, because that’s exactly what he looks like) is a complete moron. He fucked up about four things (including my lunch order) before I finally just blew up at him in the office. It was classic. He was whining about how late he was going to be working and I said (in front of about eight people), “No, you’re going to go home early tonight and get some rest, because if you pull any of this shit tomorrow I’ll fucking kill you.” A hush fell over the entire office as people stopped to see if I was joking. I wasn’t.

Again, won’t bore you with details, but thanks to Joe’s fuck-ups we were hours behind on everything. Had to go down to Balboa Park (a notorious gay spot in San Diego) to set up for the cross country meet. It was very disturbing (I swear I heard two guys fucking in the bushes) and we were there until dark, so I was getting pretty livid. Plus I still had laundry to do for tomorrow’s game, and I was starving due to the aforementioned lunch debacle. We finally got back to campus after 8pm and had a quick bite to eat. My boss went home because he was getting up at 3am to run the cross country meet, leaving just me and Joe. I started loading all our vans for the trip down to the stadium in the morning (actually I was shifting contents from one van to another because of another of Joe’s fuckups).

Finally got home after midnight and had to do a quick load of laundry before going to bed just after 2.

—

Imagine driving this at 5 in the morning with drunks flying past you at 60+ mph...

Let me tell you, my 4:30am alarm was not met with a smile. I stumbled out of bed cursing, threw on some clothes and drove to campus. There I picked up our department’s new prized toy, an electric car. These carts are really nothing more than glorified golf carts. They go 25 mph (with a governor on them so they can’t go faster) and are legal on all streets with a speed limit of 35 or less, but they’re open and flimsy like golf carts so they’re not what you would call safe. So at 5 in the morning, with the dawn just barely breaking, I’m driving one of these carts the five miles or so to Qualcomm Stadium on a road with a speed limit of 45. Drunks were flying by me at 60+ and I was seriously thinking I was going to die. I made it to the stadium a little after 5:30 and started my day.

With my boss at the cross country meet I was the man in charge until about 1pm, and we were scrambling from the get-go. But I persevered, providing fearless leadership to my army of hot girls dressed in short shorts and tight tank tops. Things went so well that, despite the fact that the field wasn’t even painted for a football game until after 2:00, we had all our shit pretty much wired except for a few minor glitches.

—

The game was a shootout. We lacked depth and our defense sucked, but goddamn our offense was exciting. Before the day was done our QB had passed for over 500 yards, we had one receiver with 296 and another with 150-some. Unfortunately, after jumping out to a 22-0 lead we faltered and ran out of gas and lost 39-28. But it sure was exciting.

So postgame cleanup began about 10:45. This is always a tedious process since everyone is tired after a very long day, pissed off after another demoralizing loss, and generally wondering why they’re here when they could be out getting drunk. I was doing surprisingly well considering I’d been working for 17 hours straight and awake roughly 35 of the last 37 hours.

We got cleaned up in near record time and were out just a little before 1am. I still had to drive that damn cart back to campus but I was determined to make last call. So I grabbed what I needed out of my bag and stuffed it in the glove box (the only secure area of the cart) and left the rest of my stuff (change of clothes, etc.) in one of the vans for Monday. Tripod and I piled into the cart and we rolled down the hill to the bar. We pulled into the parking lot and the drunks started hollering at us, making fun of our cart. We found a parking spot and dashed in just in time for last call. Some of the department staff were there commiserating the loss, and Wayne The Mormon said the first round was on him, so of course I ordered a double gin & tonic. It was oh-so-fucking-good, and although I still didn’t feel tired I was so deliriously punch drunk that I might as well have been hammered. I was shamelessly ogling girls, spewing profanities about all the people that had pissed me off in the past two days (some of whom were still in the bar), and generally making a total ass out of myself.

We finally got kicked out at 2 (after I had managed just two drinks) and I headed for the cart to drive back to campus.

And it was only then that I realized that when I grabbed my stuff I had forgotten one vital thing: my keys. So my car was sitting on campus and I couldn’t get in it. And I couldn’t get into my apartment either. Son of a bitch. Must have been more tired than I thought. I got someone to give Tripod a ride home and started the 9 mile journey home in the electric cart. I had to drive right through campus, and it was utter chaos. Frat parties and drunk people all over the streets. They were screaming at me as I cruised past in my electric cart, and more than once some shitfaced kid tried to run into the street and jump into the cart, so I was weaving down the street like an obstacle course. It was madness.

I finally made it home about 3. Pulled the cart around the side of the building, scraping bushes as I go, until I was right under my second-floor patio. Climbed on top of the cart, jumped up to grasp the rails of my patio, hauled myself up, busted the screen door open, and entered my apartment. Then I had to go out the front door and park the cart before going back inside.

By this time I was starving. I don’t think I had eaten for at least ten hours. So I popped a frozen dinner in the microwave. When it was ready I settled into bed to watch a little Sportscenter while my dinner cooled down…

Imagine waking up next to this 10 hours after it came out of the microwave.

…I woke around 8 in the morning, my head laying next to my untouched microwave dinner. I’m lucky I didn’t fall asleep in it. It was disgusting. I set it on my nightstand and went back to bed until the Bears game started at 10.

—

And that’s the story of my 23-hour day. Roughly 40 hours of work in a span of just over 42 hours. (I was getting paid for 30 hours a week at the time.) Needless to say, I got drunk six straight days the next week!

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**Part 3 of one of the sadder failures of my life. Sometimes all you can do is shake your head at my younger self’s stupidity.**

—

I gave Julie a call the Monday after their tournament and left a message and she called the next night. We talked for about five minutes (I adhered to MaximMagazine’s advice that you should never talk to a girl longer than you can have sex with her). It went pretty well and we agreed on a Beachcomber rendezvous Thursday night. Finally we would be on my home turf.

Wednesday night Prada gave me a call around 11. You’ll remember she’s friends with Big Becky. She said during class, acting like a 15-year-old, Becky leaned over and asked her, “Have you talked to [Single White Alcoholic] lately?”

I had worked long and hard with Prada to teach her how to properly handle these situations and not make me look like an idiot, so she played along and gave a “No, what’s up?”

“He called Julie.”

“Oh really?”

According to Becky, Julie didn’t think I would call her, so she was duly impressed when I did. Julie thought I was “a cool guy,” and wanted to get to know me better. Becky then started pressing Prada for details. Is he really cool? Would you date him? Prada came through big time, saying that it wasn’t an option since she worked for me, but under other circumstances she could definitely see herself dating me. (What a great friend, lying through her teeth like that.)

Now, if all this sounds like something out of junior high school, well, it did to me too. But, I must admit, it was amusing and entertaining in its own weird way. Kind of like mixing the nostalgia of youth with the rampant alcoholism of my modern day life.

—

Thursday night Tripod, Prada and I met up for dinner and the Lakers-T’wolves playoff game (I’m not a big NBA fan but Kevin Garnett is one of my favorite athletes ever) before heading to the ‘Comber. Since the game ran late there was a long line at the door, so we went to the back door and used our connections to get in.

We grabbed a drink at the back bar and made a lap around the bar. The place was packed. We were at the front door talking to the doormen when Prada spotted the girls. There were like ten of them at a table right by the entrance. They had already spotted us and a junior high giggle session was beginning. Prada said, “You’ve been spotted, you better go say hi.”

So I cruised over and it was all eyes on me. Julie was right next to Becky, so I had to give the big girl a big hug before I could even say hi to my target. It was awkward for both of us with everyone standing right there, and since I had just arrived I didn’t have the proper buzz to loosen myself up. But we made the best of the situation. I put my arm around her waist in a non-threatening-yet-slightly-threatening way to say hi. She gave me some grief about my T’wolves, and I played the disappointed-yet-gracious-in-defeat role to perfection if I may say so myself.

Their table was right on the edge of the dance floor, which was spreading like an amoeba, so one of the bouncers came in and hauled the table off, and suddenly we were all standing right in the middle of a budding dance floor. The girls were just starting to get the dance bug, but I still didn’t have enough alcohol in my bloodstream. I was talking to Julie when Kenny, the assistant coach and only guy in the group, came up to console me on the T’wolves. We talked playoffs for a minute before he suddenly said, “Sorry, dude, I’m fuckin’ up your game,” and disappeared. I’m pretty sure she heard him.

Smooth.

Def Leppard’s “Pour Some Sugar on Me” started up and the girls went nuts. (Don’t all girls do that when that song comes on?) I watched bemused as they started dancing. Prada appeared at my side and started berating me, “You need to make a move!” I explained that I needed more alcohol before I could break it down, plus I didn’t need to be hanging on her hip every second. A little distance isn’t a bad thing. The night was young, and my game is strictly ball control; no wide-open spread offenses here. “But you need to flirt more,” she insisted. I told her in no uncertain terms that I had it all under control. (I didn’t, but her critiquing my every move wasn’t helping.)

About that time Hot Hippie and Will The Mormon both started calling, saying they were outside in line. I sent them around back and worked my magic to get them in. (I love the ‘Comber, it’s the only place I’ve ever felt like a big shot.) We talked for a bit and I was about to head back towards the dance floor when I saw the girls heading our way. I got Hot Hippie and Julie together, and it was a touching moment since they hadn’t seen each other in years. The problem, though, was that Hot Hippie was supposed to be there to help my game; instead, she monopolized Julie’s time for a good 20 minutes as they caught up. I tried to make myself look busy, social butterfly that I am, cruising from group to group (my students Beer Slut and Smurfette, both smokin’ hot, were there by then, and of course I had to hug and ogle them).

Eventually they migrated back towards the dance floor, and after getting myself a fresh gin and tonic I decided to make my move. I waded into the crowded dance floor, not really sure where she was. Kenny saw me, grabbed me, pointed her out, and pushed me through the crowd with a “Do your thing, dude!”

She was kind of in the corner of the dance floor by the DJ booth, so I was able to corner her for some serious grinding. I kept close and intimate, making my intentions clear. But the problem was Becky. She kept trying to worm her way in, like she was trying to cockblock me or something. I wasn’t happy, but I couldn’t be a dick to her so I had to take it. Tripod, of course, was nowhere to be found to help deflect her (he was busy with some girl who would eventually give him a lap dance on a bar stool, but that’s another story altogether). Will The Mormon was busy flirting with Hot Hippie and the other girls, so he was no help either.

Eventually, someone mentioned doing shots and I jumped at the opportunity to withdraw from the three way dance circle. I took Julie, Becky and another friend to the bar for kamikazes. (And I sent one across the bar to Callie, Julie’s best friend who hated the ‘Comber and didn’t seem to like me too much.) Julie thanked me and gave me a little kiss.

Oh yeah, closin’ in for the kill.

At some point I headed for the bathroom and ran into Kenny. While we were urinating he said, “Dude, you got Julie in the bag, dude.” He was utterly hammered. I pressed him for details but all he would say is, “Dude, just go work your magic.”

We went back and danced a little bit more, but Julie was fading fast. I knew she was drunk, but didn’t realize how bad. After a while she just disappeared. I went to the bathroom and the bar for drinks and when I came back she was gone. Prada and I did a lap and couldn’t find her. We asked her friends and no one seemed to know. Stranger still, nobody seemed particularly concerned. Where I come from, you keep track of your friends when they’re drunk. Especially girls. I was concerned, and not just because I was hoping to get laid.

Prada was ready to head home, and everyone had parked in the same lot, so I decided to walk Prada to her car about two blocks away and take a look around. Sure enough, I saw a form sitting on the curb of a little tree island in the middle of the parking lot. I sent Prada off and went over to check on her. Julie had her head buried in her arms between her drawn up knees. I tried to initiate conversation but couldn’t get anything more out of her than “uh huh” or “uh uh.” So I just sat down beside her and rubbed her back until her friends finally showed up.

No sex for me tonight.

When Callie pulled the car up and I pulled her to her feet she promptly started puking. Hanging off the back of the car, just spewing her guts out. That started a conversation as to when the last time anyone could remember seeing Julie puke. The general consensus was freshman year. I did my best to keep her hair out of the way as I witnessed history and her friends made fun of her.

Then the dumb girls realized they had left one of their friends back at the bar, so most of them piled into one car to drive back and find her. That left just Julie, me, and Kenny and his girlfriend. Kenny was smashed by now, leaning sideways and slurring almost incoherently. But he was still intent on helping me out. He told his girlfriend they had to leave right now, then came over and gave me a breath mint and said, “Do your work, dude.”

Really? Right after she’s puked?

They drove off, leaving us alone again. She was cold so I gave her my shirt (I had a T-shirt on underneath; I’m not that generous!) and put it over her shoulders. It was near closing time when Tripod called me. “Where you at?”

“No,” I said more forcefully, “take your time. Know what I mean?” (Hint, hint.)

“Ohhhhh. If you want me to stay just say ‘yes.’”

“Yes.”

“Alright, dude, call me when you’re ready.”

So we got a few more minutes of semi-intimate comatose time before the girls showed back up. Their little tiny two-door Honda already had five people in it. Callie hopped out and popped the trunk, grabbed a couple grocery bags and made a “double lined puke bag” for Julie. Then we loaded her in the front seat on top of another girl and I sent them on their way. Everyone except Callie thanked me for taking good care of her, saying such annoying things as “You’re such a great guy,” and “You’re so sweet.”

Ugh, not a good sign.

As they drove off I realized Julie still had my shirt. Then I quickly realized that was a good thing; now I’d have to get it back from her.

Sometimes I amaze even myself.

I rounded up Tripod and we headed home. Going into the night I had had two goals: 1) To ask her out on an actual date and 2) to make friends with Callie, because I thought she’d have to endorse me for this whole thing to work. Neither goal was actually achieved, but I felt pretty good about things nonetheless. During the drive back I gameplanned with Tripod; we agreed it would be a good idea to call the next day just to see how she was feeling. How long should you wait to call someone after they’ve puked? When I vomit I’m pretty much out of commission for a solid 12 hours, so I figured about 1 or 2 in the afternoon would be good. We also agreed that I needed to start drinking a lot more.

When she answered the phone the next day she just started laughing. “I’m sorry,” she said.

“Don’t worry about it,” I responded, “I just wanted to make sure you weren’t dead.”

“I’m okay now. This morning I wasn’t doing too well. I barely made it to class.”

(Class? My God, I would never even think of going to class the day after a binge drinking session.) “What time was class?”

“Nine. I barely woke up at 8:30.”

“Jesus, girl, you’re a fuckin’ trooper!”

She was on the road to Lake Havasu for a weekend of drunken debauchery in the desert, and after about five minutes she lost reception in the desert. I left her a message saying I’d call when she got back in town.

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In a previous post, I admitted that I did not lose my virginity until I was 26. Well, a little over a year after that I had my first girlfriend, Lacey. At the risk of sounding like a total asshole, I never really liked her that much. But she was into me, she was a fellow Illini fan in San Diego, and I figured I should at least experience a relationship so I’d have some idea what to expect in the future. So I dated her for about four months. This is the story about what happened next.

—

It was a chilly Friday night in lovely San Diego. At the Division II school I worked at we were hosting women’s volleyball and men’s soccer at the same time. Volleyball was ranked #2 in the nation and dispatched their foe in less than 90 minutes, so that by 8:30 I was beginning to get the wild notion in my head that I might actually get to go out and get drunk tonight. After finishing up I went out to the soccer field to see where things were at. Surprise, surprise, we were deadlocked in a 0-0 tie late in the second half. (When I die and go to hell I’m sure it will be a neverending scoreless soccer game. With stands full of foreigners and sell-out Americans trying to tell me how futbol is the purest sport.) My dreams of intoxication were fading fast.

But then my buddy G-Man called me. “Dude, what’re you doin’ tonight?”

“Well, right now I’m watching a bunch of soccer fags not score.”

“Dude, I’ve got twelve super-hot chicks on their way over to my place right now to pre-party, then we’re goin’ to Typhoon.”

“Damn you!” As most of you know by now, Typhoon was my favorite bar in San Diego.

Let me tell you a little about Meghan. I’d only met her once, I couldn’t tell you a single thing about her other than the fact that she knew G-Man from college. But I did know that she was hot. Smokin’ hot. About 5’8″, blond with blue eyes and a killer California tan, great tits and an ass that wouldn’t stop. Everything about her was pure sex appeal. Mind you, she might have been retarded or gay or even a communist for all I know, but just the opportunity to stare at her cleavage all night was more than enough to make me pull rank on my staff and cut out of the soccer game just as it was heading for double overtime.

(Sidebar: I’m sure there are some soccer fans reading this story, and I do not mean to offend, but honestly, is there anything dumber than the term “Sudden Victory?” Not “sudden death,” no, that would be too manly, too aggressive, too much like real sports. Sudden Victory.)

So as I’m slinking away into the night, hiding from upper management types that might question my decision to leave things in the hands of my borderline-retarded assistant, my phone rings again. It’s the ex- girlfriend.

Since our break up, we had been on surprisingly good terms, mostly due to the fact that we had kept a pretty safe distance from one another, making it easy to avoid those tough “We need to talk” moments.

She was piss drunk at a friend’s party (a friend I’d love to sleep with, but that another story). I told her I was heading out to Typhoon with G-Man. “Ohhh,” she said, “I was going to go there but now I’m too drunk and I don’t have a ride.”

“Oh, that’s too bad,” I answered, not meaning it. We exchanged a few pleasantries and that was that.

Before I go any further, I should roll back the tape a bit. After breaking up with Lacey I had sent an email to a couple of my closest friends explaining the reasons for my dumping her. I won’t bore you with that lengthy diatribe, but I will quote the brilliant email my buddy Family Man sent me in response:

“[Single White Alcoholic], while all of these are valid reasons for a split, I’m willing to bet a nice bottle of gin that you will get to experience some good old fashioned break-up sex in the next 30 days. Scientific studies have shown that male/female relationships ending due to break up are closely followed by a one-time intense sexual encounter involving the split couple 94% of the time. I’m sorry to say it’s a virtual scientific fact that you will have to experience some break up sex at least one more time in the near future. The fact that it’s football season and both your favorite college football team and your fantasy football team are going to suck will ensure that September will be a very emotional time for you. Throw in your normal rate of alcohol consumption and a little bad judgment and you’ll be up to your ears in reason #4 [bad blowjobs] before you know it.”

Although this piece of brilliant illumination was fresh in my mind, I wasn’t really considering it at that moment. I was just thinking about a great night of drinking with G-Man and staring at the beautiful angel Meghan.

I raced home, took two shots, made myself a fat Red Bull and vodka for the shower (sippy cups: they’re not just for kids!), and raced out the door. Along the 15 minute walk to the bar, sipping on another cocktail, I got a text from Lacey: “R U at Typhoon?”

Oh Lord. I should have lied, but being new to relationships (and break-ups), I fired back a quick “On my way,” to which she responded “I’m trying to find a ride but everyone is drunk.”

I got to Typhoon and found G-Man so drunk he could barely stand. “Been drinking since 4,” he announced, putting his arm around me. “I’m toast… Come on, let’s do shots.” We knocked back some Jager, then he said, “Come on, let’s go find Meghan.”

We found Meghan and her friends in a corner of the bar. She was almost as hammered as G-Man. G-Man immediately seemed to sober up (he’s a world-class wingman) and with absolute clarity introduced me to her, even though we’d met before. He raved about what a great guy I was, how good of friends we were, everything to set me up as well as possible. Then he gave me a quick look, a conspiratorial smile, and told her, “And he’s a huge Lakers fan.” Then he disappeared.

(For the record, I am NOT a Lakers fan. I don’t even particularly like the NBA. What a guy.)

Meghan took my hand extra affectionately and started talking some nonsense about her Lakers. I stepped right into character, talking about the Purple and Gold like they were my favorite team. I lamented the loss of D-Fish; talked optimistically about Lamar Odom; reminisced about countless smackdowns laid on the hated Sacramento Queens. I was on top of my game. And the best part was she was so drunk I had free rein to ogle her marvelous breasts to my heart’s content.

G-Man hadn’t been lying about there being a dozen girls in the group, so I didn’t get to spend as much time with her as I would have liked. They drug her off to the dance floor, and while she was dancing G-Man and I drank more. And it was just about that time that Lacey started calling. “We’re on our way there. Don’t leave!”

Shit.

How to handle this one? I knew I was getting too drunk to juggle. Without a solid solution, I decided to immerse myself in more booze in the hope that it might spur some ingenious plan.

The alcohol didn’t help, but G-Man did. When Lacey walked in I turned to him with a look of confused desperation, to which he just patted me reassuringly on the shoulder and said, “She’s the bullpen dude. You hope you don’t have to turn to your bullpen, but it’s there if you do.”

Wiser words have never been spoken.

Lacey arrived with one of her law school friends and some random dude she knew from somewhere. I had met him once before but had been drunk at the time, and upon learning he was a Michigan grad I’d rudely ignored him. This time I gave him an aloof handshake and continued to ignore him. I was friendly enough to Lacey and her other friend, but I was definitely focused elsewhere.

At this point the night begins to get fuzzy. Meghan came back our direction and I was talking to her, probably too drunk to even think about whether Lacey was noticing. As it turned out it wasn’t necessary. Apparently the Michigan guy was trying to make a move on her. Had I known this my reaction would have been, “Great, have at it.” But instead, while I was diverted, G-Man took it upon himself to bitch Lacey out for “pulling that bullshit” in front of me. He ripped her up and down, tearing her apart not only for bringing another guy around to “make me jealous,” but a scumbag from a rival school on top of it. Stumbling drunk and slurring his words, G-Man then threatened to beat the Michigan guy up.

G-Man was so effective Lacey came up to me apologizing for her behavior, and I just nodded drunkenly, telling her it was alright (it would be several days before I pieced things together enough to know what the fuck she was talking about). It was nearing last call and Meghan was about to puke, her friends carrying her to the door, and I realized I’d missed my chance.

So, with sad reluctance I walked out to the mound and called for the bullpen…

And it was just that easy. The Michigan boy disappeared, the other friend drove us to my apartment, and drunken sloppy monkey sex ensued.

In the morning there was that agonizing awkwardness, that terrified sense that at any moment she would say something like “We need to talk,” or “Does this mean we’re back together?” or “Wow, you’re a lousy lay when you’re drunk.” But fortunately she was in even worse shape than I was, half sick with a hangover and trying to piece together the previous night’s events. She didn’t even remember how she had gotten to my place. I just laid there in a hungover stupor, trying to put off getting up as long as possible. Somehow I lucked out and her friend returned to pick her up, so I was free to stay in bed and sleep off my hangover.

But in the aftermath things definitely got more awkward between us. Lacey’s law school friend informed her about G-Man’s threatening to beat up the Michigan boy and she wasn’t happy about it. I refrained from making an issue of why G-Man felt compelled to take such action (i.e. the Wolverine was trying to get in her pants) because that would have required more talking, and because it would have implied that I cared who she slept with.

The next day I saw her at the bar during the Bears game, and thankfully she waited until after the game to start in again, but she still wanted to complain about the way I had been treating her since the breakup. Then, not 15 minutes after she had walked out the door, she was texting me apologizing and inviting me to dinner with her friends. I turned off my phone and took a nap. I may not have known much about relationships, but I knew things were going to get a lot worse before they got better.

As a follow up to the weekend’s events, I had to email Family Man to concede our bet of a bottle of gin. And I also had to ask him a question:

“You said it was a 94% probability of a one-time break-up sex… what are the odds of it happening more than once? Others have said that break up sex can be some of the best sex ever… was this not the case because we were so hammered, or is there just no hope whatsoever of ever having good sex with this girl? And what are the odds of us staying at least civil enough that I don’t have to find another bar to watch the Illini’s next seven losses?”

While I’ve certainly never claimed to be a great ladies man (have you read my stories???), I’m ashamed to admit that, outside of priests who have taken a vow of celibacy, I’m probably in the absolute last percentile of how long it took me to lose my virginity. And my first instinct is to spend the next 2000 words making excuses for why it took me so long to get my dick wet. But that would just be whining like a little bitch, so instead I’ll steal a line from The 40-Year-Old Virgin as way of explanation:

“It just never happened. When I was young, I tried, and it didn’t happen. And then I got older and I got more and more nervous because it hadn’t happened yet. And I got kind of weirded out about it. Then it really didn’t happen. And then, I don’t know, I just kind of stopped trying.”

Seems as good an explanation as any. I’ll expound upon it only with this: I come from a family that doesn’t drink alcohol. I’ve never seen my Dad have even a sip of alcohol in my life (his father dying in a drunk driving accident that he caused from the passenger seat might have had something to do with that). I’ve seen my Mom have about three strawberry daiquiris in my whole life. Drinking was never part of our family culture, and so my older brother never drank either. Without good solid alcoholic role models it took me a long time to find the joys of the hooch. I think it was senior year in college before I ever got drunk. And it wasn’t until I moved to San Diego and met my boy Tripod that I finally became a full-blown alcoholic. By that time I was about 24 and pretty much a wreck with the opposite sex, so it would still take another two years before I finally broke through to the promised land.

This is the story of that night.

I was out drinking with my buddy Sandpaper on a lazy Saturday night. One of those nights where we just didn’t feel like getting all dressed up, driving out to the hot spots in town, droppin’ a wad of cash, so we opted for our neighborhood dive bar, a place called the Hearth House. The place was a shit hole, but it was less than three blocks from our apartment and the drinks were so outrageously strong you could get shitfaced for pocket change. (One night I ordered a double gin and tonic, just to see how strong they would actually make it. The bartender gave me a tumbler full of gin with a few ice cubes, not even a splash of tonic.)

This was back in 2002. You might recall that was the height of the Golden Tees craze. I don’t like to brag, but I was pretty goddamn good at it too. (I think never having played real golf before gave me an advantage; I would try shots no legitimate golfer could fathom on a real golf course.) I also focused my complete attention of the game when playing. While I would usually be drunkenly ogling hot ladies while hanging with my friends, when playing Golden Tees I was focused like the ninja. Other than talking shit to my friends and dancing around celebrating Great Shots Points I was oblivious to the entire bar.

Maybe it’s the theory of girls going for jerks, or only wanting what they can’t have, or some such shit, but whenever I was in full-on Golden Tee mode girls would actually show interest in me. A few times before I’d been hit on by total strangers while working my game.

But this night would be the stuff of legends.

I’m not gonna lie, she wasn’t cute. Average height, average body, brown hair, decent rack, ass a little too big for my taste (just like her belly). And it took me awhile to realize it, but she had a bit of a mustache too. Not a terrible one, but the kind that women nowadays have the sense to wax because, let’s face it, NO guy likes that.

She came up behind me while I was lining up for a big approach shot on the back nine. She started rubbing my bald head and I was nothing but annoyed as I short-armed my shot and missed the green. I was already starting to turn and say something rude to her when Sandpaper, sensing opportunity, jumped in and started working her like a used car salesman. Within moments he had ordered a fresh round of stiff drinks for us all, pulled her friends over (both of her friends were hotter than her), and soon it was a small party by the Golden Tees game.

I don’t remember when I actually stopped caring about the video game and started thinking about getting laid. It was probably a couple holes after Sandpaper had stopped paying all attention to the game and I was beating him sufficiently that it wasn’t even fun to talk smack anymore. So we started letting the girls take some shots for us, all the while plying them with more alcohol.

The girl (we’ll call her Suzy, because that was her name) was clearly into me, and after a sufficient number of Hearth House megadrinks I was starting to warm up to the idea of fucking her. I swear to God, I actually remember the drunken rationalization that went through my head:

No, she’s not hot.

But you’re a 26-year-old virgin and you’re getting dangerously close to dying alone.

Did you think your first time would be with a supermodel? Would you even want your first time to be with a girl you actually liked?

Oh look, she has a tongue stud. That always looks fun in porn.

You just gotta get one out of the gate. Get yourself in the game. Once you’ve bagged this 4 there will be a world of 10’s ahead of you.

So I decided to go for it. All in, balls to the wall. With Sandpaper as my wingman we put on the full court press for the rest of the night. By last call we were all a retarded drunken mess. One of the girl’s boyfriends had appeared on the scene, and one of the bartenders also appeared interested in one of the girls. (I can’t remember if it was Suzy; probably not.) We were in the parking lot, all discussing what to do. The girls lived at an apartment complex not too far away with a swimming pool. But they had no booze at their place, and neither Sandpaper nor I had any swim trunks. Conferring with Sandpaper and confirming that we were in it to win it, I told him to keep everyone there in the parking lot. Meanwhile, I jumped in my car and careened drunkenly up the hill to our place to snag booze and swim trunks.

I came screeching back into the parking lot some ten minutes later, we rounded everyone up and headed in a caravan of vehicles for the girls’ apartment. I don’t think there was a sober person in any of the four cars.

By this point I was approaching drunken blindness. Details at the apartment complex are sketchy at best. It was a huge place, and numbered in no discernible order. I remember wandering around forever looking for their apartment, having no luck whatsoever, finally finding them at the pool and having Suzy walk me to their place so we could change into our trunks and make cocktails for everyone. It had to be past 3 am by this time.

At this point I have to make a public and formal apology to my good friend Sandpaper. In my haste back at our apartment I had only been able to find one pair of swim trunks. I frantically searched the mess of my bedroom, looked through his bedroom, couldn’t find anything. Somehow I found a pair of women’s soccer shorts. Don’t ask me how they were in my room (this was long before I crashed and burned with the smokin’ hot women’s soccer All-American Coconut; I’ll tell that story some other time). But however they found their way there, in my drunken state I remember holding them up, thinking to myself, “Sure, these will fit Sandpaper,” and running out the door with them.

Well, they didn’t fit Sandpaper.

The poor guy looked like an extra on the set of Hoosiers. They were so short and uncomfortable he looked like a complete buffoon. He was pissed at me too. But, being the good friend that he is, he sucked it up, strode out to the pool with his moose knuckle on full display, and dove into the pool.

Again, details are sketchy because I was getting drunker by the minute, but I remember making out with Suzy in the pool for lengthy stretches of time. I remember one of the girls went to bed, leaving only the girl with the boyfriend. They had been fighting about something, and now the boyfriend was passed out on one of the deck chairs. Sandpaper, meanwhile, was trying to keep the girl occupied so I could work on Suzy. But as some point I remember him coming over to me in the pool and saying something along the lines of, “That chick just grabbed my junk! I think she wants to fuck someone to piss off her boyfriend. This is gonna be a great night!”

Finally, sometime around 4:30 (totally guessing here), Sandpaper and I decided it was time to head home. I have no idea what happened to the other girl and her boyfriend. I just remember being back in the apartment with Sandpaper and Suzy; he was rounding up our shit to leave and telling me it was time to shit or get off the pot. So I asked Suzy if she wanted to come home with me.

“I don’t know if that’s a good idea.”

“I know it’s not a good idea. But do you want to come home with me?”

(I swear to God I actually said that. Who knew I had that kind of asshole game in me???)

“Will you bring me back in the morning?”

“Sure.”

And that was all it took. We piled into my car, Suzy and I getting in the backseat to make out while Sandpaper chauffeured us home. Cheers again, Sandpaper, you should be in the Wingman Hall of Fame!

Now, I should explain here that I had a crappy little Pontiac Sunbird at this time in my life. It was about a ’94 model, had over 100,000 miles on it, and was on its last legs. It had a 4-cylinder engine that whined when you stepped on the gas. Sandpaper thought this was immensely entertaining, so as I was making out with Suzy in the backseat he was repeatedly stomping on the gas pedal as hard as he could to hear the engine whine. He did that the entire ride down the highway, stomp on the gas pedal, giggle as the engine made the sound of a dying animal, then take his foot completely off the gas and coast a few seconds before doing it again. In the back of my mind I knew this wasn’t a good idea, but since I could literally see the end of my virginity in sight I just didn’t give a fuck. I had bigger fish to fry.

Back at our place Sandpaper went straight to his room and shut the door, making himself invisible to give me my moment. Suzy wanted to smoke so we had to make a stop at our patio before retiring to my messy bedroom and heading straight for the bed.

It wasn’t pretty. She wasn’t pretty. She had a pierced nipple, which I’ve always had a thing for, but that was about it. I have no doubt that I was one of the worst lays of her life too. It’s not that I was too quick; this wasn’t the typical teenager getting laid for the first time and blowing his wad in 30 seconds. No, this was a 26-year-old man who had never done ANY of the shit he’d seen in porn for the past eight years and trying to check it all off the list in one night.

I went down on her for about two minutes. Then I asked her to blow me. But that didn’t last long either because I desperately wanted to stick my dick in her and make it official. I wrapped my dick up with a condom for the first time. (Side note: I can’t even guess how many condoms I bought between the ages of 18 and 26, futilely hoping that someday I would have need for one. Dozens? A hundred? God only knows. Is there anything sadder in this world than knowing you couldn’t use a condom before it hit its expiration date?)

Once inside I rolled through all the positions I could think of. Missionary, cowgirl, reverse cowgirl (only to discover my dick didn’t bend quite that way, ouch!), doggie, some kind of half-spoon thing I had seen in a porn once. She must have thought I was a hamster on crystal meth. When I finally came I just collapsed on the bed beside her, thinking to myself:

AT LAST!!!!

By this time it was after 6 in the morning and the booze was beginning to leave my bloodstream. I was exhausted but I figured I should try to get one more fuck in while I actually had a real live female in my bed. She wanted to smoke first, so we went back to our patio, where she smoked while I tried to put just enough moves on her to convince her to let me bang her again.

Unfortunately, our patio faced the sunrise, and once she saw that she was enthralled. She kept saying how beautiful it was (our patio overlooked a strip mall and a Costco, it was most definitely not the romantic sunrise you’re imagining). Suzy made me sit and watch that fucking sunrise with her for another 20 minutes before I finally managed to coax her back into bed for round 2.

And round 2 was only mildly better than round 1. I wasn’t quite as ADD about trying every position in the book and we actually fucked for a solid while. But then there was a moment where it felt like the condom had come off, I freaked the fuck out, and even after pulling out and seeing I was indeed still protected the moment was lost. It was time to take Suzy home.

Remember how Sandpaper had been fucking with my car the whole way home? Well, as I was driving Suzy back to her apartment in the shameful light of morning, my engine started overheating. I practically had to coast into her apartment complex. After the obligatory kisses and promises that I would call her (I never did), that this wasn’t just a one night stand (it was), I sent her on her way and drove about half a block away from her place before I had to stop and let my engine cool down for 20 minutes before I could start making my way home again.

I had to stop three more times on the drive home. It took over an hour to go less than five miles. My car was fucked.

But you know what? I didn’t care. I had become a man!!!!!!

I got back to my place and slept until about 5pm. Then I made Sandpaper follow me while I took my broken down car to the repair shop. (It would end up costing me $1500 to repair. Thanks, Sandpaper.) While driving me home he offered me a hundred dollars to call Suzy up and have her come over that night and fuck her again.

“Nope,” I answered, “it’s time to turn the page. That door is now closed. I’m a new man.”

My girlfriend has forbidden me to tell anymore stories about her. But she has granted me a special exemption to tell this doozie. (I think she felt so guilty that she figured she had to let me write it.) So here goes…

—

This summer we took a roadtrip from End Of The World, Utah to attend a wedding in San Diego. Since she had never seen that part of the country we decided to drive. With summer construction it took us a good 13 hours, and in our haste to make it and get off our asses we skipped dinner to motor through, pulling into my friends’ place (the infamous Dead Wing and Prada) around 10 or 11pm.

We promptly started drinking. It was my girlfriend’s first time meeting Prada and Dead Wing and I had been a little nervous of how everyone would get along. You know how it is the first time your new girlfriend meets your friends, you worry about it way more than you should and it ends up being totally fine. Same thing here. Dead Wing and I started knockin’ back a refreshing gin and tonic, while Prada and my girlfriend went for a bottle of wine.

Before long, they opened a second bottle of wine. Meanwhile, on an empty stomach I was beginning to feel a little buzzed after just one oversized and overpoured G&T. It was going to be a good night.

I should probably explain here that my girlfriend can drink with the best of ‘em. I mean, she can put ‘em away like a champ. We haven’t actually had a drinking competition (I’m too old for that, plus I don’t think drinking should be a challenge; as long as everyone gets fucked up everyone wins) but I’m quite certain she could outdrink me. She does, however, have one weakness: when she gets truly hammered she blacks out completely. I’m not talking a spotty memory like most of us. No, her mind just goes blank. So, she often does or says things while intoxicated that she has no memory of, and many times she amazes even herself at the shit she does (i.e. saying we might be soul mates after knowing each other less than a month). When this happens, she refers to it as having an alter-ego. She even has a name for her alter-ego: Trixie.

This was definitely a Trixie night.

It started when she decided to invite herself into their hot tub. Not that anyone minded, this was a splendid idea, and it actually made me feel good that she felt comfortable enough around my friends to do so. So we all got into our suits and piled into the hot tub, pausing only long enough to refill our drinks.

It was a warm night and before long we were all rotating back and forth from the hot tub to the refreshingly cool swimming pool. And the girls were cracking open a third bottle of wine. We were all having a grand time.

But Trixie doesn’t have a very long shelf life. When she comes out to play there’s only a short window before she is completely obliterated and the night is over. On an empty stomach and after a long day on the road she went from drunk to sloppy to obliterated in the blink of an eye. It was time to go to bed. So I helped her out of the pool (almost losing her into the deep end), walked her into the house (almost losing her through the screen door) and into the guest bedroom, and let her fall onto the most comfortable aerobed I’ve ever slept on.

Of course, before we could go to bed we had to get out of our wet swimsuits. My girlfriend was no help whatsoever, so I had to untie her bikini (yes, it was the infamous Buffalo Sabres bikini) and pull it off her while she laid half passed out on the aerobed. With that job done, all that was left was to get out of my own swim trunks and I could pass out.

Now, at this point I would like to remind everyone that I had been in the pool for some time. You’ve all seen the Seinfeld shrinkage episode, right? It happens. It’s nothing to be ashamed of, everyone’s dick shrivels up when it’s cold and wet.

Well, as soon as I pulled my trunks down my girlfriend stirred and lifted her head just enough to give me a look. Then, with a look of drunken disgust on her face, she said, “I don’t like it. It’s small.” As if that wasn’t insulting enough, she then reached out and slapped dismissively at my shriveled cock and balls. Not hard, mind you, it’s not like she hurt me. No, this was worse, because it was so dismissive, as if my penis were completely irrelevant.

I began to mutter something along the lines of Costanza’s shrinkage speech, but she was already passed out.

So, what did I do next?

Well, let me tell you. With my pride wounded there was only one thing to do:

I fucked her.

Hard.

She was basically passed out when I climbed on top of her, but I quickly brought her back to semi-consciousness with my crude, rough, drunken advances. I pounded away at her while she more groaned than moaned, still not entirely aware of what was going on. I knew I was too drunk to cum but I didn’t care. This wasn’t about pleasure. This was about restoring my manly pride. And after I had satisfied myself that I had proven my manhood again I rolled over and passed the fuck out out.

The next morning she awoke with a start, half jumping out of bed. “Why am I naked?”

Not quite sure how I felt about the previous evening yet I gave the most simple answer. “We had sex.”

“Oh… Was it good?”

—

I waited about a day and a half to finally tell her what had happened. She was horrified. Absolutely mortified. But she also thought it was pretty fucking hilarious. And, to be honest, once I had gotten over the initial shock, I thought it was pretty damn funny myself. And after she spent the next week apologizing and reassuring me that my penis was perfectly decent, we reached an understanding that we could all laugh about this, the latest of Trixie’s antics.

At Tripod’s suggestion, I named this Operation: Jayhawk Down. He felt it still had a nice military ring by referencing Black Hawk Down, but also highlighted the now infamous “Not Everything Is Flat In Kansas” shirt.

Canada steals all our jokes.

—

Fast forward to Senior Day at water polo. Coach had planned a post-match reception so I used the opportunity to bring Tripod. I got all decked out in some of my most stylish clothes, and if I may say so, I looked pretty damn good. The only problem was that I had conked my head on something at softball earlier in the day and had a good gash on my normally pristine shaved head, so I compensated by wearing a floppy hat that made me look either really cool or like a stoner.

After the game I was chatting with Becky, the heffer who had class with Prada and was no doubt passing along damning information to Julie, when Julie walked up with a big smile. “What’s up?”

“Not much, what’s happenin’?”

“You goin’ out tonight?”

“Possibly,” I answered, trying to sound mysterious and not too overeager. “Where’re you guys goin’?”

“No, it’s cool, it’s low key. Jeans and T-shirt kinda place, not like you’re all decked out. What’s up with that, tryin’ to impress the boss?”

“Yeah, I figured for the one game he showed up this year I should look good.”

“Yeah, no shit.” No one really cared for the Athletic Director, and it’s always a good move to show ‘em I’m not one of the suits.

Big fan of swimmers changing in public.

One of the best things about water polo players is they have no problem changing right in front of you. Julie threw a T-shirt on over her swimsuit so she could strip out of her suit. Fighting every urge in my body, I politely turned away and withdrew. (Of course I took a peak first.) I found Tripod and gave him the lowdown. “Let’s do it!” he said, always the loyal wingman.

But I wanted to wait. I’m thinking it might seem a bit too much if we show up at this place just because she vaguely mentioned they’d all be there. After discussing it, Tripod agreed; we should wait and see if there’s anymore opportunity to weasel our way in without being too obnoxious about it. Lo and behold, five minutes later Julie came up to me and handed me an invitation for the club’s grand opening party that night. We’re in!

—

After the reception I headed home to get ready. I was ecstatic that we were going to a low key bar, because that meant I could wear my lucky shirt: my old white and blue Illinois ringer-T. The same shirt I was wearing when I ascended into manhood last fall. (Yes, I was 26 when I lost my virginity. Quit laughing. I’ll tell that story another time.)

The Local had been open for about two weeks but they were celebrating their grand opening that night. It’s a nice place, a little small, but stylish without being too trendy. The DJ was pumping out a variety of old and new rap/dance that had everyone bumpin’. But the best part was that, although all the guys were all dressed down like myself, most of the women must have thought they were goin’ clubbing, because they were all decked out in their most whorish outfits. Cookie cutter blondes everywhere. I was like a kid in a candy store.

But I had learned a valuable lesson at Effin’s. I didn’t want to be too sauced before Julie even arrived, so I was taking it easy on the gin & tonics. This was made easier by the fact that the service was abysmally slow. The waitresses, the bartenders, they all seemed to be on their own schedule. But, like I said, that wasn’t necessarily a bad thing in this case.

Before too long the girls all showed up. What’s awesome about Julie and her friends is they do not get dressed up. Julie’s got a natural beauty that doesn’t need any makeup or platform shoes or tight black pants. She had on jeans, Skechers and a wife beater and looked fucking ridiculous. I rarely see her with her hair down, and let me tell you, it was a sight to see.

Playing it cool, I laid back and let the scene settle a bit. Julie and Co. hit the dance floor and I waited.

After a couple more drinks Tripod and I made our way to the edge of the dance floor to survey the scene. I was starting to get sufficiently buzzed to start thinking about dancing, but I didn’t want to just wade into the crowd, I wanted to wait for her to call me out. It didn’t happen. She saw us and didn’t even acknowledge me; she gave me a shy little smile and a wave to Tripod, then went right back to breakin’ it down with her girlfriends.

Now I’m pissed. I can feel the air coming out of the balloon. So, to assuage by bitterness, I started drinking heavier. With the slow service I resorted to the tactic of ordering a drink with the waitress, then going to the bar and ordering another. This strategy effectively doubled my drinking capacity, and at several points I was double fisted with G&Ts.

Adding to my anger, this cute chick walked by me and said, “Illinois sucks.” Nothing else. She had a sweet, flirtatious smile, so I didn’t know whether she was hitting on me or not. She was a tight little brunette with a great body and pretty eyes. Being moderately intoxicated, I looked at her semi-bemusedly and asked, “Where are you from?”

“Illinois,” she answered. I scoffed at her stupidity, so she said, “I don’t have anything wrong with the state, I just hate the school.”

Before too long, Becky came over and insisted Tripod and I come dance with her and some friend. Stacking drinks on top of one another, I waded into the dance floor and started working on my specialty dance move: foot shuffle, hip sway, take a sip; foot shuffle, hip sway, take a gulp. Julie was literally five feet from me, but separated by 180 pounds of Becky. The booze was starting to get to me, my beer balls were getting bigger, so finally I just walked up to her, grabbed her arm and said, “You gonna do a shot with me?”

“Hell yeah!”

When in doubt, alcohol is always your best wingman.

I took her by the hand and waded through the crowd to the bar. Here at last the slow service helped me out, as we had time to engage in lengthy conversation. We made small talk, she put her arm around me, all seemed to be going well. Somehow she forgot where I went to school so I pointed to my shirt and she proceeded to run her hands all over my chest.

Oy!

So in the midst of all this, standing at the bar with Julie on my right, this girl on my left started nudging me, trying to strike up a conversation. I looked over and it was the same bitch who had been bagging on Illinois earlier! She started nudging closer, vying for my attention, talking about some such shit I wasn’t listening to. Finally I turned to her and said, “Aren’t you the same girl who was baggin’ on my Illini?”

She tried to look surprised. “Oh, I’m sorry!”

“So where did you go to school?”

“UCLA.”

I laughed out loud. “You’ve just lost your talking privileges,” and I turned back to Julie, never to acknowledge her again. Julie was impressed.

So we were still waiting to get our order in. I swear the nearest bartender was as slow as Rain Man. But I didn’t mind. We started talking sports. She loves football. A very good sign.

We finally got our order in and now just had to wait another ten minutes or so for Rain Man to make the drinks. We chatted some more, got a little closer, until she says, “So who do you think is going to win the national championship this year?”

Uhh…

I was dumbfounded. This wasn’t the sort of conversation I was expecting to get involved in with this girl. Trying to recover, I decided to try and snowball her a little bit. “Well, I think it’s hard to bet against the defending champs Ohio State until somebody actually beats them.” (Like I’ve even looked at a roster for next season yet; it’s only April!)

“Yeah, but no one’s repeated since Nebraska ’95, right?”

It took every bit of self-control not to drop down on one knee and propose right on the spot. Fortunately I was saved by the arrival of our drinks, so we promptly knocked back our shots and grabbed our fresh drinks before she pulled me back to the dance floor.

Now it’s finally my time. We’re dancin’, grindin’, gettin’ close. But of course, Big Becky stole the opportunity to sandwich me between them, so now it’s back to a whole group dance thing. Nothing is ever easy around here. I just kept drinking.

Details begin to get sketchy at this point, and I don’t really recall how or why we left the dance floor, but next thing I knew I was at the bar getting drinks when Julie and four of her friends stormed the bar and climbed up to dance on the bar Coyote Ugly style. Bedlam ensued as rookie bartenders panicked. The whole scene didn’t last one full song, but suddenly the place was hoppin’. I spotted Julie getting off the bar and pulled her over for another shot.

When in doubt, alcohol is always your best wingman.

Don’t really remember what all we talked about. I brought up the “Not Everything Is Flat In Kansas” T-shirt and told her how it is already legendary in my circle (and how big breasted Country coveted the shirt).

By around 1:30 some of her friends were just sloppy drunk. Casey, the girl who won the drink-off at Effin’s, is so belligerently drunk she wants to get in a fight with one of the bouncers, so they all decide to take off. Casey’s already been kicked out and the bouncer is threatening to call the cops, so what does Casey do? She whips out her cell phone and calls the police on the bouncer. I’m sure she called 911 too. Classic.

There was a group of about five girls walking back to their car, so Tripod and I made the two block or so hike with them. Tripod did yeoman’s work to keep the rest of the group a safe distance ahead while I walked with Julie. But it was pretty near impossible to keep all those drunks, especially belligerent Casey, totally out of the picture, and they kept impeding on my moment so I couldn’t really make a good move.

Finally we got to the car, everyone started piling in, and I realized this was my last chance. Time to step up to the plate. I took an aggressive step to pull her aside behind a concrete pillar. “So, you’re out of town next weekend, right?”

“Uh huh.”

“When’re you leaving?”

“Thursday.”

“Shit, so Beachcomber’s out. What about two weeks, we’ll head on down to the ‘Comber?”

“Sounds good.”

“Now, I’m not going to see you at any more games,” I said slyly, reaching for my phone, “so I’m going to need your number.”

It’s like a lightbulb went off in her head. Her eyes lit up and a smile crossed her face. “Are you asking me for my number?”

“Well, yeah.” Duh.

“Okay.”

And the mission is accomplished. I put her in the car, watched them drive off, and gave a hoot of joy. Then we hit a late night pizza place, grabbed some grub, and chilled in my car for about an hour until I was okay to drive. I fired off some celebratory text messages to Prada and Country, which is really pretty sad if you think about it; yeah, I finally got a 21 year old’s phone number, I’m cool.

To Be Continued…

This picture has nothing to do with my story. I just wanted to throw it in.

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As you read the title of this post, I know what you’re thinking. “This poor sap is pining over some chick he lusted after and never had a chance with.”

But that’s not true. You see, Mary was a bartender at one of my favorite bars in San Diego, the Beachcomber. And while she was quite hot –skinny and blonde with a surprisingly healthy rack– my fond memories of her have very little to do with her hotness.

When you work in college athletics you wind up working a lot of weekend nights. Friday and Saturday night sporting events really cut into your prime drinking time. We would always bust our asses to wrap up after games as quick as we could so we could get out and have some semblance of a night out, but the truth is the weekends were not when we had most of our fun.

Tripod and I used to go to the Beachcomber on Monday nights. Originally it was supposed to just be a laid back night for us, have a few drinks and unwind from the weekend, get prepared for the upcoming Wednesday and Thursday nights when we did the majority of our damage.

But, like most of our attempts at “low key,” we failed miserably.

The Beachcomber was a ghost town on Monday nights outside of football season. There were many times when Tripod and I were the only customers there. But since we knew most everyone that worked there from our regular Thursday night debauchery we liked it. We were kind of like Norm from Cheers.

Mary was a fixture at the ‘Comber, a great bartender who knew her shit, treated her customers well, and was fun to look at on top of it all. Why she bothered working those dead Monday nights I have no idea. But I’m sure glad she did. Because once we started coming in regularly she decided to make us her personal guinea pigs to experiment on with new shots. We would sit there for hours, paying for a handful of gin and tonics (and whatever the fuck Tripod was drinking that week; that guy can never just pick a drink and stick with it) while getting a near endless supply of free shots. Good shots, bad shots, fruity shots, bitter shots, pretty shots, flaming shots, straight shots; you name it, we tried it all.

One night sticks out in particular. Tripod and I were good and drunk, it was near closing time, and Mary had already plied us with more free shots than we could count. I have no idea how it came about, but Mary and the bouncer had the brilliant idea that we should take shots of Wild Turkey straight through a straw.

Now, in retrospect, there’s nothing at all that sounds appealing about this. The idea of a shot is to pound it and get it headed towards your stomach before your body realizes just how disgusting it is. A straw totally defeats the purpose of this, it makes you taste every drop of it. Not smart.

But of course we were too stupid to think about that. About the best defense I could come up with was to ask for a chaser.

Big mistake.

I should have just gotten another round of our usual drinks, something I knew I’d enjoy and would properly cleanse the palette. But instead, Mary got a mischievous look in her eye and said we should do Mind Erasers for chasers.

For those of you that don’t know, Mind Erasers are shots themselves. Really big shots. A typical Mind Eraser is 6 ounces, 2 ounces each of vodka, Kahlua and tonic water. Like our Wild Turkey, you drink it with a straw, and by the time you’ve sucked it all down there’s a good chance your mind has started to erase the night from your memory.

We should have said no. Hell, we should have run out of the bar and never looked back. But we weren’t that smart. And Mary had a peculiar power over us; she could make us drink just about anything. I think it was a combination of her bartending skills and her engaging personality. And probably her breasts.

So we did it. Slurped down straight Wild Turkey, fighting the urge to vomit the entire way. Then chased it with a Mind Eraser. Slurped that down too, right down to the ice.

As soon as I put my glass down I turned to Tripod and said, “We need to leave right now. ‘Cause when this hits my bloodstream in about 15 minutes we won’t be going anywhere ’til morning.”

I sped all the way back to Tripod’s apartment in a race against time. I’m sure I was over the legal limit before the Wild Turkey and the Mind Eraser. And things were getting downright scary by the time I pulled into the driveway of his apartment. But we made it. I turned off the engine and neither of us moved. I let the wave of alcohol hit me and just resigned myself to the coma. For the next three hours the only reason either of us moved was to stumble outside to piss in the bushes. I don’t think we even said a word to each other, and I’m pretty sure the sun was starting to come up by the time Tripod finally stumbled off to his apartment and I drove the rest of the way home.

Shortly after that epic night, Mary succumbed to the dark side and got lured away from the Beachcomber to work at some fancy schmancy hotel lounge/club downtown. Tripod and I went one night to see her and check the new place out, but after paying $11 for drinks and not getting any free shots we quickly realized that not even the great Mary could turn this place into a bar we would want to drink at.

That was almost ten years ago. I like to think that Mary found her soul again and went back to working at dive bars and getting people good and truly fucked up, as was her calling in life. I sure hope so.

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THE WISDOM OF DOUG STANHOPE

They say if you give a man a fish, he'll eat for a day, but if you teach a man to fish.... then he's gotta get a fishing license. But he doesn't have any money. So he's got to get a job and get into the Social Security system and pay taxes, and now you're gonna audit the poor cocksucker, 'cause he's not really good with math. So he'll pull the IRS van up to your house, and he'll take all your shit. He'll take your black velvet Elvis and your Batman toothbrush, and your penis pump, and that all goes up for auction with the burden of proof on you because you forgot to carry the one, 'cause you were just worried about eating a fucking fish, and you couldn't even cook the fish 'cause you needed a permit for an open flame. Then the Health Department is going to start asking you a lot of questions about where are you going to dump the scales and the guts. 'This is not a sanitary environment.' And ladies and gentlemen, if you get sick of it all at the end of the day... it's not even legal to kill yourself in this country.